The house is in the good hands of Charmaine who's house-sitting so Rosie will get a break from the boys whilst being well looked after.
So, phones off, computer off, adios Blog, Facebook, Twitter et al for 10 days. Fantastic!
-
The Finnie family in Blighty, December 2021
-
Dean and Paula pastor The Gathering together -
The Gathering -
Baptisms at The Gathering -
Preparing to serve at The Gathering's Soup Kitchen -
Soup Kitchen Welcome To 2022 lunch
-
Serving hands - the heart of The Gatheirng -
Thankful Thursdays -
HOPE Home Based Care Team -
Gathering Ground -
Staying fit as a family -
The Helderberg - The prettiest of the mountains we face
The house is in the good hands of Charmaine who's house-sitting so Rosie will get a break from the boys whilst being well looked after.
So, phones off, computer off, adios Blog, Facebook, Twitter et al for 10 days. Fantastic!
Once a week whilst studying at All Nations our tutorial groups were posed with a conundrum under the guise of Mission In Practice. There were rarely straightforward answers and more often than not no real answers at all, just plenty of discussion, some good arguments and the occassional chance to wind someone up for a laugh!So here's one for today..
I joined Joel in class today to help with the final stage of his puppet making. Each of the children had to design a puppet, work out what they needed, get the materials (plenty of running around for Mummy!) and then make the puppets. So today's stage was finishing off the puppets and the parents had been asked to come and help and I was the only Dad there.
We missed the National Arbor Week last week but may just have made ammends this week.
With a bit of help from my mate Rod we've just planted four indigenous trees in the garden. I love trees so it's a real privilege to be able to plant some and especially to plant indigenous trees that are in harmony with the environment.
Still we've got a great evening lined up as we'll be out enjoying a good meal with good friends as we celebrate Jo With The Blue Car's 40th birthday. It should be a lot of fun!
Bring on the next 19!
A few previous posts about our anniversary.
Having said that, I do think there's a place for exercising a degree of common sense and looking at the 'scaffolding' being used by these plasterers on the house being built at the back of ours, I would suggest this might be a good opportunity for applying said common sense!
I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the whole issue of church and what it is or what it shouldn’t be and what we as Christians should and shouldn’t be doing.A case in point at present is the whole media circus around a tiny church of 50 and their idiotic pastor. Either he’s a marketing genius who has got himself known all around the world or he’s a lunatic. Either way there's very little of the grace of God in his interviews etc. Anyway, he’s not my main topic here and he’s already had way too much publicity so back to the question in hand.
Two things I’ve read lately have come back to bug me and the more I think on them the more I feel they are simply wrong. It took me a while to come to this conclusion because one of the comments came directly from a church leader I have massive respect for and the other came from a leader in the same church.
Yesterday we realised another dream as we were able to take 3 ladies, from the 3 different communities in which we work, to visit a local empowerment project, Learn to Earn. It is based in the largest township outside of Cape Town (around 1 million people!). Their motto is 'a hand up, not a hand out', which we love -that is the only real way to empower people.They offer courses in sewing, cooking, woodwork, computing, graphic design and admin skills to the unemployed, asking them to contribute 5% towards the cost of the course (ie: approx £20 to £40).
The rest of the gang have been fine throughout, suffering only the vagaries of a very grumpy dad and husband but they seem to put up with me well.
His attention was then fully grabbed by AC/DC's Back in Black.
When he'd finished he brought over his picture and proudly announced that he's going to get the red guitar when he's older and play like the man in his school uniform.
He makes me so proud!
Thankfully, we don't judge people on appearances but rather by what we see in their actions in life. This lady is truly a hero to us!
After church on Sunday most of us trotted off home for a decent dinner, maybe some roast vicar with acidic gravy followed by the obligatory kip on the couch.
It would be really easy to do just such a series on the likes of the amazing George Műller, Hudson Taylor, C.T. Studd or Jim Elliot to name a few that come to mind. However just about all that can be said about these heroes has been said and I'm not pretending to have any new insight into their extraordinary lives. If you're interested in the lives of some of these heroes and church history generally pop over to the Church History Blog by Lex Loizedes, it's a great read!
We had a lot of fun today as we went into Cape Town and spent ages in the South African Museum and Planetarium. The guy on the door gave a knowing smile as the boys shouted "DINOSAURS!" and ran off to the dinosaur gallery. Guess where we spent most of our time.
the boys were inspired to ask to go to the museum again after watching Night at the Museum 2, it's a really good fun film and certianly fired up their imaginations.
Afterwards we strolled up to Long Street which is full of great cafés and pubs and we had a cracking lunch.
Today was very special as the HOPE home based care team, prospective carers and spouses of some of our patients received customised home based care and HIV/AIDS training from Nicky Welsh. This is something that Paula has been wanting for over a year now and it has taken this long to 'pin down' Nicky and make the most of her excellent training skills!! We had loads of fun as well as refreshing (for some) our knowledge and skills base and having the ability to further customise the training for our final session next Friday.
Eli was whisked off to the Emergency Room for the first time this afternoon as he needed three stitches in his top lip.Initially we thought he'd fallen off his bike trying yet another daredevil stunt but it turns out Rosie (the dog) bit him. Daddy's first response was to get rid of the dog but the Dr that treated Eli reassured Mummy that this is quite a common injury and not to be too harsh on the dog.
It turns out that Rosie had just been given a bone and Eli bent down next to her to pick up a ball but Rosie thought he was going for the bone. The rest as they say is history.
One of my favourite quotes from Wiersbe which I feel is particularly pertinent to those of us in church leadership. I'm convinced more leaders would at least look wise, even if they're not, if they exercised Wiersbe's advice.
Our blog has been nominated in the Best Personal Blog category of the 2010 South African Blog Awards.This is pretty neat after 6 years of blogging, thanks to Jo for the initial nomination.
Please click on the image and cast your vote for Facing The Mountain
PS. Voting opens on 1st September closing on the 17th.
Montagu is a little taste of heaven on earth and that is exactly what we enjoyed as a family last weekend! We have loved staying at 'Farmer Koos's' farm over the years and the boys definitely treat it like a second home.The weather was perfect - 29 degrees in the winter! - beautiful sunny days. Joel and Eli spent the whole time outside making up adventures on the rocks which they could now climb, playing with the animals that roam freely around the farm and enjoying braai'ing and eating Dad's beef potjie!
We also enjoyed a great meal out together on Sunday night at Jam Tarts, a restaurant we have got to know. They cannot do enough to make us welcome and Joel, in particular, enjoyed his garlic prawns - which the lady knows to make, despite them not being on the menu!!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
